Donnerstag, 10. September 2015

Step 12: Hanoi Rocks and Catba Island Beach Camping

Hunting Horseshoecrabs in Halong Bay

Reunited with my freind from home I never met before, Celina








Small language barriers with our skipper who picked us up the next day again, but had to take a picture of the beach so he would remeber, felt a little scatchy ...




The Day after the beach camp, tourist visit our beach just called Tiance Beach by the locals, us.

View from a 4$ room ...


Fires at the beach


Nice little rock climbing retreat in the center of the island


Samstag, 27. Juni 2015

Step 11: Mud Bath in a cave in Phong Nah Ke National Park




Breaking the law actually standing on the caves floor













Phong Na Keh National Park is famous for it's huge and amazing caves and the countryside itself which is beautiful. The area just started to get know by tourist who before that only came on bus tours to the caves for a day and then left back to Hue again, so the first Hostel in the village we stayed in was only open for three years at that time.
We rented motorbikes and saw the two caves that are most famous, in one day. First Paradise Cave which is build out for tourists which means, a boardwalk through the whole cave and spotlights on the drip-stones but that is both needed because the cave is to big and at parts to steep and would be pitch black dark without any light.
We were quit lucky because usually the cave is really crowded but we just arrived at noon time when the people had just left and the second group that starts at the second cave hadn't arrived yet.
The second cave called Dark Cave is not accessible without a guide and much more of a fun activity than taking pictures and walking on boardwalks.
They give you climbing gear and a live-jacket and then you sip line over a lake into the cave, get of swim through a lake in the cave and end up in really muddy and narrow hallways leading to a chamber completely filled with mud. All of it is extremely fun and the group of people was awesome so we were covered in mud even before we reached the mud-bath because we had a constant mud-fight.
On the way back you kayak over the lake and try to wash of the mud (I still had mud in my ears days after). Here too we were lucky being the last group in the cave so we were alone with our guide who was using the great acoustics to sing Vietnamese songs.
All in all an expensive day but also one of the best days in Vietnam and I would already call the the drive to the cave worth it going to the National Park.

Step 10: Riding to Hue and a abandoned water park

From Hoi An we wanted to go to Hue but not by bus again but by motorbike because it is supposed to be one of the nicest rides of the whole track from Ho Chi Minh to Hanoi. So we rented three motorbikes with four people to ride the only 160 Kilometers up north, which took us nine hours after all.
We first went to a National Park that is located on a peninsula just in front of Danang and is for some reason not visited by tourists at all.
Expect of two resorts on the entrance and a radar station on the highest top the Rainforest is untouched and just cut through by two concrete streets that are only visible at the part where the motorbike wheels keep the plants from overgrowing the road completely.
So you are riding through the forest but still on an easily drivable road and after getting to the top where the radar station is, you can enjoy an extraordinary view over the whole bay and the mountains enclosing it from the other side. A small both that sold ice cold beer made it perfect.

After that little detour we went straight back to the big street that should lead us to Hue and followed it until the trucks use a tunnel and we used a mountain pass to cross the mountains. It was hard to drive longer than 10 to 15 minutes because there are so many scenic watch-outs on the side of the road. When the mountain road meets up with the High Way that comes from the tunnel again, the really nice part of the ride is over because after the last 60 Kilometers are still under construction and you have to share the road with a lot of reckless driving trucks and always adapt to the changing stages of the road being built.
Still it's impressive and when we stopped for some food just 10 Kilometers out of Hue and had Vietnamese Noodle soup with fresh noodles a woman rolled, cut and boiled for us within a minute. Our faces where all so covered in dust that, my finger would leave a white stripe when I would touch my face.
I was really happy to eventually get to Hue because after the long ride in long pants, a long sleeved shirt and proper shoes, everything was soaked in sweat or it's salty remains and I was obviously also happy that I got there save.

The city of Hue was not to interesting as I though, they have the Citadel which is the biggest tourist attraction, but only seemed a little overpriced after going in and only finding a vast area of still destroyed buildings from the Vietnam War and Buddhas every now and then. The much cooler thing was a abandoned Water park about half an hour out of town, which isn't cared for since a couple of years because apparently a child drowned. That means, you have a complex of Aquariums that ran dry over the years with the bones of it's inhabitants on top of the dry sand and water slides that are getting taken back by nature but you can still climb up. A really special but also a little creepy place because there is none in the huge area.





























Oli posing infront of a burning Fuel Truck, why ever it was burning and nobody did anything



The water park is the main thing that we wanted to see in Hue so we continued to Phong Nah Ke National Park after two nights in Hue.